


The Experiment

by forestfantail



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Experiment Trope, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Pancakes, Season 1, The Bus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:33:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25532149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forestfantail/pseuds/forestfantail
Summary: Experiment Trope! Season 1 Simmons gets a message about her future relationship with Fitz and decides to conduct an experiment to prove that they just couldn't like each other that way. It doesn't turn out the way she'd planned.
Relationships: Leo Fitz/Jemma Simmons
Comments: 44
Kudos: 68





	1. Chapter 1

Jemma Simmons wasn’t used to being confused. Not only was she smart, but she was ridiculously well-educated. When she encountered something she didn’t understand, she knew how to find a solution. Follow the scientific method, formulate a hypothesis, experiment. There were steps that always led her when she was lost, that gave her a sense of control when she was surrounded by chaos.

Take being on the Bus, for instance. She had fallen from a plane, been infected with an alien virus, and shot a superior officer in the chest, and all in the last month. She had wanted adventures—and she had convinced Fitz that he wanted them too—but she hadn’t been prepared for just how out of control she would feel when out in the field. At least she had the lab, where she could solve her problems in methodical style. And at least she had Fitz, who felt the same way that she did. Science was comfort and science was Fitz and Fitz was home.

Which is why now that Fitz was the thing that confused her, she felt shaken to her core. He was her rock, her support, and her connection to solid science in the roiling chaos that was their current lives. But here he was, avoiding her eyes and looking confused himself. There was only one rational solution. She would have to follow the steps that she understood, those of science. This called for an experiment.

It had all started when they talked to the sorceress. Of course, that’s what the non-scientists called her; Fitz had been appalled at the idea that they were dealing with a magical being. Bless him.

The sorceress had in fact been a woman with possible precognitive abilities, and they tracked her down in hopes that she might be the Clairvoyant for whom they had been searching. She had not been the Clairvoyant; she had been a shut-in with apparent mental health issues. Her small apartment had needed a good scrub and had smelled of mice dung (she had dozens of them in little cages, decorated with toys and miniature castles and topiaries). The moment she had opened the door, she had started spewing utter nonsense at them.

“Dying, it’s kind of my superpower!” she had said to Coulson. He had given her one of his patient smiles and asked if they could come in, explaining that they were from S.H.I.E.L.D. and had some questions.

She had stepped back and waved them in. As Skye walked past she said, “If I’m not Quake, I can’t be the Destroyer of Worlds.”

“Ok,” said Skye, “I might need to go back to the plane for this one.”

The woman had dark skin, greying and matted hair, and was wearing a polyester nightgown printed with a floral pattern. Her eyes were wide and wild and darted around like she was seeing more than just their faces, but when she looked at Ward her eyes took on a laser focus. She squinted at him and pointed to his chest. “Weakness,” she said. He winced.

“Permission to secure the perimeter, sir?” he said. Jemma had to stop herself from laughing out loud. Grant Ward, afraid of an elderly woman.

Coulson nodded and Ward left the apartment. Skye had detected some chatter about the woman in the darker reaches of the internet, which is why they had come looking for her. It was possible the Clairvoyant was looking for her too, so they couldn’t be too careful.

“Ma’am,” said Coulson. “We’re here because we’ve heard that you have the ability to predict the future. Several people heard you describing the Chitauri attack before it occurred.”

The woman wasn’t listening to him. Instead she was staring at Fitz, an affectionate smile on her face. “I still prefer him in cardigans,” she said.

Fitz blushed and backed toward Jemma, who placed a protective hand on his elbow. “Perhaps we could run a few tests, ma’am? We might be able to help you,” said Jemma. It was not appropriate to walk into a stranger’s home and ask to run tests on them, but then this woman clearly needed help. Also, Jemma didn’t like the way she was looking at Fitz.

The woman’s attention turned to her, however, and Jemma liked that even less. She pointed at Jemma’s hand on Fitz’s arm. “I ship it. I really do,” she said.

Jemma let go of Fitz and looked at Coulson. “Sir?’

In the moment that Jemma looked away, the sorceress crept in closer to her. She grabbed Jemma and Fitz’s wrists and looked back and forth between them. “Distance is our curse,” she said. She looked like she might weep.

“Let them go,” said May. She reached out a hand, but the sorceress looked at her and snarled. “Dancing,” she said. May jumped back like she’d been bitten. “I thought that would shut you up,” said the woman.

Her grip was firm but not painful, and Jemma felt her pushing her and Fitz together. “We can’t waste any more time,” the woman said.

“Ok, that’s enough,” said Coulson. He stepped in and pulled the sorceress away from them. “We think you might be in danger. You’d be safer with us.”

The woman frowned. “If I come out, will you shoot me? ‘Cause then I won’t come out.”

“We don’t want to hurt you; we’re trying to save lives, including yours.”

The entire team was against bringing her on the Bus, but Coulson seemed to have already developed a soft spot for her. Curse him and his kind heart, thought Jemma.

“This isn’t precognition. She’s speaking nonsense,” said May.

The sorceress looked at Fitz and said, “Gesundheit.” He sneezed.

Coulson smiled and looked at May. She shrugged. “Maybe she has the power to make people sneeze.”

“Whatever is happening, I’d rather not be in the room with all these mice,” said Fitz. He sniffled. “She really needs—”

“A scented candle,” said the sorceress. She pointed around the room at her mice cages. “There’s no shame in it, Fitz.”

“Hang on,” said Jemma. “That’s not from the future, that’s from a few weeks ago. When we had the dead body in the lab. Maybe she’s not seeing the future, maybe she’s a spy.”

She tried to give the woman her most intimidating expression, but the sorceress only smiled back. “You’ve been beside me the whole damn time,” she said.

Jemma stepped back from her. She was done with this. “Sir, I don’t know what is happening, but I would like to leave.”

The door burst open, and Ward ran in, breathing hard. “Coulson, we have hostiles. A couple vehicles, looks like Cybertek, just rolled up out front. The back exit is clear, if we leave now.”

Fitz sneezed again.

“Gesundheit,” said Ward. The others stared at him in shocked silence. “What?”

“Time to go,” said Coulson. He was looking at the woman, lost in thought. “But I’d like her to come with us. If that’s alright with you, ma’am. I think there’s a chance we could help each other.”

The sorceress looked again at Fitz and Simmons and nodded. “Maybe there is,” she said.

xxx

On the Bus Fitz and Simmons were preparing the tests. They had uploaded the standard precognition test packet from HQ. It had long been in use but not a single participant had passed.

“This is nonsense,” said Fitz. “She’s odd to be sure. She speaks in riddles. But they could mean anything. That’s how tricksters like this operate—give just enough vague info to keep you guessing.”

Simmons wiped the tabletop down again before placing her tablet on it (the woman’s home had left her with a powerful urge to clean). “She does know something about the past, at least.” She didn’t want to remind Fitz of the things the woman had said—especially about being beside her the whole damn time. Fitz had said those exact words to her, and they had confused and elated her. She didn’t know why, but they felt way too personal, like he had told her a secret.

Fitz seemed to know what she was talking about, because he wouldn’t look at her. “That’s an even better reason to not bring her on this plane. She already seems to have intel on us.”

Fitz was cut off by Ward, who escorted the sorceress into their lab. She walked around the room looking at their instruments.

“Welcome, ma’am,” said Simmons. “We were hoping to run a few tests—”

“I’m engineering; she’s biochem,” said the woman. Jemma glanced from Fitz to Ward, who looked as freaked out as she felt.

“She’s standing in the exact same place you were when you said that,” Ward said to Fitz. He shook his head, like he was trying to dislodge something that didn’t belong there. “Nope, just—just a coincidence.”

The sorceress tilted her head to the side, looking at Ward. “I know that you care about us, Ward,” she said.

“Yep, I’m out,” said Ward, bumping into the door as he backed out of the lab. “Let us know if you find anything.”

The old woman blinked and then turned to Fitz. “Can we start over? Back to where we began?”

Fitz glanced at Jemma. Even if he didn’t believe the woman had special abilities, he was clearly unnerved by her. This would be up to Jemma then.

“Yes, that would be wonderful,” said Simmons. “Let’s start at the beginning.”

They hadn’t been able to find out much. Most of the tests weren’t even possible since the woman seemed incapable of answering simple questions. The visual and auditory centers of her brain lit up like a Christmas tree whenever one of them stepped near her, but that was about all they had determined.

“It’s like her brain is ablaze. Neurons fire seemingly at random. No wonder she can’t hold a conversation,” said Fitz. “There’s something seriously wrong in there.” Fitz was pointing at the scan of the woman’s brain that he and Simmons were showing to the rest of the team.

“So she’s not the Clairvoyant?” asked Coulson.

“I don’t think with that brain she could run as coherent an operation as Centipede,” said Simmons.

“Are there any other tests we can run?” Coulson asked Jemma.

“Well, there is one,” she said. The rest of the team waited for her to speak. She didn’t want to say it. Admitting that science had failed to show results made her more uncomfortable than the ramblings of this poor woman. “We can wait for something that’s she’s said to come true,” she said.

Skye groaned, and the rest of the team looked just as exasperated. “We have no idea how long that will take,” she said. “Or if she knows anything useful anyway. This sounds like a dead end to me.” She turned to Coulson. “What’s our play, boss?”

Coulson was looking past her out into the commons area of the plane. The old woman had wondered in and was inspecting every surface of their chairs and tables. “She may not be of much use to us, but someone is still after her. I say we protect her, drop her off at a facility where S.H.I.E.L.D. can keep an eye on her.”

The woman stepped into their comms center. She held up a piece of paper with a huge grin on her face. “I read the safety pamphlet,” she said.

Coulson smiled back at her. “She knows something, that’s for sure.”

The team decided that the sorceress should spend the rest of her time on board in the containment room, not because she was a prisoner, but—as May put it—“because she creeps me out.”

Fitz and Simmons were guiding her to the room, bringing water and a blanket. The woman had taken a liking to Fitz. She was holding onto his arm, muttering something about monkeys, when she stopped and turned around to look at Jemma with wide eyes. “What was that?” she said.

Suddenly the plane shook, and the three of them were tossed against the wall and to the ground. Jemma cried out, and Fitz stood up, though the plane was still shaking, and rushed to her side. “You all right?” he asked.

She put her hand to her temple, which had hit the wall. “I think so. Just rattled.”

Fitz helped her up before bending over the old woman, who was also trying to stand. She patted his hand and looked over his shoulder at Simmons. “Fitz? Well, he’s a romantic,” she said.

Fitz froze and his face turned blood red. He finished helping the woman up and then dropped his hands and backed away from her.

Jemma cleared her throat and tried to think of a way to smooth over the awkwardness, but thankfully she was saved by Coulson’s voice echoing over the intercom system.

“What was that?” he asked.

May’s voice responded. “Taking fire. We’ve been hit. Going to shake them. Strap in.”

Fitz and Simmons hurried the woman into the containment room, where they strapped her and then themselves into seats along the walls.

“It’s a containment pod,” said the woman as she gave an excited look around the room. The plane dipped down into what must have been a near vertical dive, and they all slumped forward against their restraints.

“Well, I’m glad she’s happy,” said Fitz. He was closing his eyes, and, from what Jemma knew about him and May’s daredevil flying, possibly trying not to vomit.

Jemma reached over and took his hand. He squeezed hers when the plane twisted sideways; she wasn’t sure who was comforting whom. She was so glad to have her best friend beside her at moments like these.

“You’re more than that, Jemma,” said the woman. She was staring at her from across the room, concern on her face. She looked down at their hands and then back up at Jemma’s face. “My heart, my home,” she said. She was almost yelling over the noise of the plane, which made what she was saying all the more terrifying.

“What is she saying?” called out Fitz.

Jemma shrugged and decided to do what she did best besides science—compartmentalize. “No idea,” she said.

The old woman sighed. “You are so English.”

After a few more moments of rolls and dives and one near-deafening explosion, the plane seemed to settle back to normal flight. May’s voice sounded over the speakers again. “Lost them, but we need to assess the damage. Orders?”

“Take us down wherever you can. Fitz, figure out what was hit,” said Coulson’s voice.

Fitz unhooked his harness and left to follow his orders. Simmons did not want to be left alone with the woman. She released her seatbelt and then the old woman’s and tried to help her stand. The woman gripped her arm and looked into her eyes. This again.

“Daddy told me to put my troubles away in the little box so they wouldn’t keep me up at night,” she said. “Bad feelings—anger, fear, pain—I would just put them inside the little box. And they would stay in there—nice and neat and crushed.”

Jemma gasped. “How could you possibly—”

“A brilliant, awkward, heroic scientist named Leopold James Fitz. He is a good man, and I love him.”

Jemma decided to stop trying to fight it. She knew what the woman was trying to tell them. “No. A lot of people think that, because we’re such close friends. But it’s not true.”

“There’s a small cottage in Perthshire we drove by once when I was a girl, some family holiday—”

“Stop,” said Jemma. “Just, please. Whatever you’re doing—stop it.”

“It’s like you’re psychically linked.” The woman seemed to be almost pleading with her. Despite her revulsion at the way this woman seemed to be invading her mind, Jemma pitied her. It must be a nightmare to only be able to express yourself in these nonsensical phrases.

“I’m sorry,” said Jemma, “but you’re wrong.”

“At the very least, you should be honest with him. If you don’t have trust…” the woman said.

Jemma patted the woman on the back and led her from the room. “I’ll talk to him.”

xxx

May brought them down in a field in rural Wyoming. There wasn’t cell service or a town for fifty miles, but there were some adorable pronghorn antelope that Fitz requested join their team.

“This is America,” he said, “what kind of team here doesn’t have a mascot?” Coulson was unmoved by this logic.

The Bus engines were banged up and the fuel lines were leaking, which meant they were grounded for the time being. They were exposed on this open prairie, and they had been shot down by some unknown assailant. Coulson contacted John Garrett and his team for extraction. If they didn’t come soon, they’d have to pile into vehicles and start driving.

“Make whatever repairs you can,” Coulson said to Fitz. “I’d rather not leave the plane if we can help it.”

Jemma was helping Fitz with repairs, sitting on the outside of the plane with a pile of tools. Fitz was on a ladder above her, his head buried in the side of the plane. Every once in a while, he’d lean out and request a tool. Jemma was mesmerized by the vastness of the sky—it was like a never-ending sea of blue. Moments and views like this reminded her of why they’d gone into the field.

“It’s peaceful, isn’t it Fitz?”

Fitz cursed and leapt back from the plane, almost falling off the ladder. “Bloody hell!”

“Careful,” she said. “I told you to check the grounding wires.”

“And I told you that there’s no way to ground anything out here.” He gestured at the field full of small shrubs—Jemma suspected they were desert sage. “I’m not trying to electrocute myself.”

She smiled up at him, which seemed to throw him off his grouchy game. His face reddened a little, and his voice sounded flustered when he asked her for another tool. This was another reason they’d gone into the field. He needed to get out of the lab once in a while.

“Maybe we could ask Coulson for a break,” she said. “When we finish this Centipede nonsense. We could take a trip. Maybe somewhere with monkeys?”

Fitz took the tool she handed him and gave her a skeptical look. “Just the two of us?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said. “Of course. Who else would we bring?” Was he thinking of Skye? She had become like family to them.

“You seem to enjoy spending time with Agent Triplett,” he said. “I thought maybe you two…” Fitz had stuck his face back into the belly of the plane, so Jemma couldn’t see his expression.

“Trip?” she said. “That’s ridiculous. He’s just a colleague.” Jemma didn’t even sound convincing to her own ears. She heard Fitz huff.

“Well, anyway, I’d much rather spend time with you.”

Fitz didn’t respond, which was just as well. Jemma was reminded of what the sorceress had said to her back on the plane. Perhaps this was why Fitz was blushing and avoiding her eyes. He had picked up on what the woman had been saying as well. Jemma took a deep breath. Better to address it now.

“Fitz, what do you think of the old woman? She was saying the most ridiculous things to me.” She thought about the things the woman knew about her childhood—about the music box and the cottage in Perthshire. Either she had some intel on them or maybe—just maybe—she did possess a little telepathy. That didn’t mean she knew about the future, though. Jemma wasn’t prepared to accept that without overwhelming evidence.

“She knew things that I’ve never told anyone. Things she couldn’t know,” said Fitz. He had turned to face her.

“Yes,” she said. “With me too.”

“You don’t think—you don’t think she’s the real thing, do you? That she’s really seeing the future?” he asked.

“No of course not. I may be willing to concede that she can pull thoughts from our minds, but no one can predict what will happen. Maybe she’s just reading our thoughts about the future? Our hopes?”

Fitz—for some reason that Simmons couldn’t fathom—looked crestfallen. “Oh,” he said. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

“That must be it,” she said. Better to disabuse him of any ridiculous notions, even if they hurt him a little. That’s what they did for one another in this world of the weird in which they worked—kept one another on the path of reason and evidence-based knowledge.

“Her pet fantasy seems to be that you and I become a couple in the future. A _romantic_ couple.” She snorted. “Sounds like more of a fangirl’s invention than clairvoyance to me. I think she has a crush on you.”

It was not lost on Jemma that the woman was basing her ideas of a potential romance between the two of them on Jemma’s own fantasies. If the woman could see into her mind, which Jemma wasn’t saying was true—she was simply entertaining the theory—but if the woman could see into Jemma’s mind, then she must have seen the dreams she had about the two of them. That was why she had mentioned Perthshire. When Jemma thought about the future it was always Fitz—the two of them tucked away in a cottage or on a trip seeing the world, always together and always blissfully happy. She guessed that these fantasies could seem romantic to someone taking a dip into her subconscious, but then no one else had ever understood the two of them. Jemma did though. She had never been so certain of anything in her life as she was about Fitz.

Fitz’s back was to her, and he had not responded. She thought he must be focused on the repairs again. Then he turned and sat down on the ladder, his eyes focused on the ground.

“You think she’s seeing our hopes and dreams for the future,” he said. “About being a romantic couple.” He didn’t say it like a question; he said it like it was fact.

Jemma realized that she might have given herself away. Her fantasies were the cause of this—with all of her thoughts about Perthshire and maybe once in a while she’d thought about how good of a father he would be, not with her child of course, but this woman couldn’t have understood that, it was really about nuance, the inner workings of her mind were so complex that this woman couldn’t have possibly understood—

“I finished with the fuel line,” he said. “At least we won’t explode in mid-air.” He climbed down the ladder. He didn’t look at her.

She reached out and touched his arm. A wave of sadness was rolling off him that she couldn’t bear. “We’ll figure it out. With the woman. She’ll be out of our hands soon. And we won’t have to think about this again.”

Fitz nodded. He still wouldn’t look at her. “I’ll go tell Coulson.” He walked away.

It was in this moment that Simmons formulated her plan for the experiment. She needed to demonstrate to the old woman and herself and Fitz and the world at large that there was nothing of a romantic nature between them. Clear the air and annihilate the awkwardness. Bring them back to a place of normalcy. Where she could have platonic fantasies about being with him forever and not feel weird about them, which she was starting to do, just a little.

Back to normal. And there was only one way to do that she could think of. She would have to initiate a romantic experiment with Fitz, and when it proved to be as ridiculous as she knew it would, everyone (including herself) would see how wrong they were for one another. No, they were perfect for one another, but not that way. And her experiment would prove it.


	2. Chapter 2

Jemma was glad to be back on solid footing. Well, she was on a plane that was rocking a little from all the banging that Fitz and May and even Ward were doing on the engines, but she meant metaphorical footing. The sturdy foundation of science that sustained her in challenging times. And any difficulty with Fitz—she realized now that since the birth of their friendship there had never been a difficulty with Fitz—was a challenging time.

She went to the only person that she thought might be able to help her with this particular experiment. She needed someone crafty and cunning, who didn’t play by the rules. And who knew about boys.

Skye was in the comms center, tapping away on a laptop. “The old lady’s having naptime,” she said, not looking up. “Thank god. She kept saying things I did not want to hear. Do you know anyone in S.H.I.E.L.D. named Daniel, by the way?”

Jemma shrugged. “Not that I can think of. But that’s what I wanted to talk about. Well, not Daniel, but about Fitz. What the woman said to him. To us.”

Daisy looked up from her laptop. “What did she say?”

“She seems to be under the impression that Fitz and I—” she raised her eyebrows for dramatic effect, “should be a couple.” She paused to let Skye process this nonsensical bit of information, but Skye just stared at her. “A _romantic_ couple,” Jemma said. Skye nodded, her expression still blank. Apparently, she needed more of an explanation. “Which is ridiculous,” said Jemma.

“Oh—right. Ridiculous,” said Skye. She still looked confused. “And you need to talk about it?”

“Well, I think she’s bothered Fitz. He seems to be unhappy with whatever she’s been saying. He won’t even look at me.”

Skye made a pouty puppy face. “Poor Fitz. I could see how that might hurt him.”

“Could you?” Jemma could feel herself beginning to blush. She was the cause of his pain, with her stupid fantasies that were easily misinterpreted—if you were a crazy mind-reading old lady who lived with mice and had nothing better to do than try to play matchmaker, apparently.

“He is…sensitive…about you,” said Skye. “I’m sorry; I don’t know what to say. I kind of thought this topic was off limits.”

“What topic?”

“You two.” Skye gestured to Simmons and the empty space beside her where Fitz usually resided. “Being a couple.”

“That’s exactly what I want to discuss, though,” said Simmons. “I want to figure out how to initiate a romantic relationship with Fitz.”

Skye was stunned. “You—you want to be with Fitz.” She grinned. “Simmons, that’s wonderful—”

“No, you misunderstand. I don’t want to be with Fitz. I want to be rid of all this speculation about our relationship. And the best way to do that is to prove that a romantic relationship between us would never work.”

Skye was back to stunned. “What now?”

“An experiment. Proceed through the typical steps that lead to romantic attachment—kissing and other things, that’s the part I need your help with—and then, when they fail, we and everyone else can finally move on from the ludicrous notion that we should be a couple.”

Skye seemed to have lost the power of speech.

“Do you not think it’s a good idea?”

“It’s a terrible idea. That’s terrible, Simmons.”

“Now hold on—”

“What are you gonna do—sit Fitz down in the lab and kiss him? Take him on a date strapped with electrodes?”

Honestly, Jemma hadn’t got this far with her planning, but those didn’t sound like terrible ideas to her. Sitting Fitz down in the lab and kissing him—that seemed like a good idea. A very good idea. For the experiment.

“Maybe?” she said.

Skye was narrowing her eyes like she was plotting, which was never a good sign. “This is what you want—to try to date Fitz, to try to _kiss_ Fitz?”

“In an experimental way,” said Jemma. Things seemed to be getting away from her; what had been a stab in the dark for control now had her feeling like she was spiraling. “To prove it’s bad.”

“But that’s not how science works.” said Skye. “You accept the results, even if they’re not the ones you expected. Right?”

Simmons felt like they were headed in a dangerous direction, but she nodded. “Yes. But I know what the results will be this time.”

Skye was all smiles again. “Then there’s no need for concern, is there?” Jemma was not feeling so confident about that.

“What should we do?” she asked.

“First you have to tell Fitz,” said Skye.

Jemma started to protest, but Skye held up a no-nonsense finger in her face.

“You have to have consent. That’s some kind of science rule, I know it is.”

Jemma sighed. “Not exactly, but yes. He’ll never go for it, though.”

Skye smiled her mischievous bad-girl-shenanigans smile. “I’m sure we can find a way.”

xxx

Skye’s strategy for convincing Fitz to participate in her experiment was simple—tell him it was really an experiment on the old woman’s powers. They needed to determine if the sorceress could accurately predict the future. The woman’s greatest preoccupation seemed to be getting them together (and saying, “Ward did this!” whenever something went wrong—no wonder the poor man was avoiding her). If they could determine that they had no future as a couple, then they would know the woman wasn’t able to see the future.

“It still won’t work,” said Simmons. “He won’t agree to it.”

“Mention the kissing,” said Skye. “Trust me.”

Jemma didn’t know why the prospect of kissing would convince him more than scientific reasoning—Fitz had quite the logical mind—but Skye did know things that she did not. Things—as was previously established—about boys.

Anyway, the idea of kissing was doing a lot to convince her own mind that this was all an excellent plan. Kissing was never a bad idea, was it? It was all to do with chemistry and biology, which were Jemma’s areas of expertise. Plus she was an above average kisser, and she did so love to do things at which she excelled. She was eager to get started with this particular experiment, if she was being honest. The thirst for science—it never left her.

They were just plotting how she should initiate the conversation, when Coulson’s voice exploded over the intercom. “Hostiles incoming. Drop the repairs and get to the vehicles.”

Skye and Simmons assisted the sorceress from the containment room and out to an SUV where May was already in the driver’s seat. Coulson said, “Don’t touch Lola,” to Ward, who stopped trying to get in Coulson’s car and climbed into the passenger seat beside May instead. Sky hopped in Lola, and the team zoomed off the ramp and into the prairie. Simmons could hear a plane overhead and the sounds of gunfire, but she couldn’t see much for the dust cloud engulfing them as they sped through the open fields.

“Lola’s taking flight,” said May.

“He’s leading them off. Hope he makes it,” said Ward.

“I’ve spent time with Coulson; he’s a good man,” said the old woman. The tiny woman was sitting beside Jemma and taking up more than her fair share of the back seat, which was pressing Jemma against Fitz. Jemma suspected it was intentional. Fitz put an arm around Jemma’s shoulders so she could lean into him more comfortably. Always so thoughtful.

The gunfire had stopped long before they reached the nearest road, so Jemma assumed that Coulson’s ploy to lead their attackers away had been successful. What kind of enemy plane had tracked them to Wyoming, of all places? She was starting to think that this woman knew something dangerous. Or was herself dangerous.

They reached a small community after an hour of driving without incident, and May pulled them into an abandoned garage, just on the edge of town. Bands of pale pink and gold were starting to light up the sky—it would be dark soon.

Coulson was there, running his hands over Lola’s hood. “She’s been hit,” was the first thing he said to them, and Jemma’s stomach dropped. She looked over at Skye, who appeared to be fine except for her hair, which was standing almost straight up. The “she” must be Lola then.

Fitz rushed over to help the distressed Coulson, and Jemma followed May to Skye.

“Coulson did some fancy maneuvers, and we evaded them. Hard to miss a red flying car, though.”

“I don’t think stealth is the point of that kind of vehicle,” said Jemma. The three women sighed. Men.

“We’ll have to lay low, spend the night here, and wait for extraction,” said May. “We can’t risk sending Lola out again.”

“Couldn’t he leave her behind?” asked Skye.

May looked over at Coulson, who was now shielding his eyes as though he couldn’t bear to watch Fitz look under Lola’s hood. “Not likely,” she said.

The team stumbled out into the tiny town, and with some luck they found a motel with rooms available. Coulson let them go their separate ways to find dinner, as long as they kept their coms devices with them and were ready to leave at all times. He took off by himself; Jemma suspected he wanted to keep Lola company. May and Ward disappeared (no confusion about that—they all knew what was going on there). Jemma was just about to suggest that the remaining three take the old woman out for a meal, when Skye stopped her in their room.

“This would be an excellent time to do the thing,” she said.

“What thing?”

“To start the secret experiment. Which won’t be a secret because you’ll tell him. You should tell him now. That you want to date him. You know what I mean.”

Jemma felt her mouth go dry. “Now? Right now?”

“Yes,” said Skye. “We’re off the Bus, so you can get him alone without prying eyes. Try going out on a date, just the two of you.”

“But I don’t have my equipment.”

“What kind of equipment do you normally take on dates?” Skye held up a hand as though trying to block that image from her mind. “Wait, never mind, don’t tell me.”

“Scientific equipment. To test for signs of attraction—elevated heartrate, oxytocin, pupil dilation.”

Skye shook her head. Her hair was still enormous from the flight with Coulson, and it wobbled on top of her head like a spinning tornado. “Simmons, do you really need a bunch of tests to tell you when you’re attracted to someone?”

“No, I suppose not.” They were talking about Fitz, though, so conducting a controlled experiment in the lab felt a lot safer than simply…going on a date.

A date with Fitz. She took a deep breath. “I’m not sure about this.”

“It’ll be fine,” said Skye. She had given up trying to tame her hair and was leaving their motel room. “I’ll bring the woman some food. You two have solved bigger problems than this. Don’t worry.”

Simmons sat down on her bed, lost in an unexpected wave of anxiety, before there was a knock at the door. Fitz opened it and peaked his head around. “Ready for dinner?” he asked. He looked around the room. “Where’s Skye?”

“She went to get the woman some dinner. I think she wanted to be alone tonight.”

“OK,” said Fitz. He closed the door and moved to sit on Daisy’s bed across from her. “Want to go to the diner across the street?”

Jemma smiled. Fitz always put her at ease. Why had she worried?

“Yes. And that will give us the perfect opportunity to work on the experiment I’ve been planning.”

“What experiment?”

“An experiment involving us.”

“Us?”

“Yes.” Jemma was actually getting excited now. She loved talking about science, and she knew that Fitz loved a good experiment. They made such a good team. “We’re going to experiment with being a couple.”

Fitz’s face fell and he inhaled sharply. “What?”

Jemma was not deterred that his reaction wasn’t as excited as her own; she only needed to explain. He’d see how sound her science was.

“The woman—we need to prove that she can’t predict the future, and the only thing she’s really predicted is that we’ll be a couple. So if we demonstrate that there’s no way we could ever be a couple, then we’ll know more about what her powers are. Or what they aren’t, I guess.”

Fitz’s eyes were wide and alarmed. She wasn’t explaining it well, apparently.

“How,” he said, spreading his hands wide, “How do you propose we prove that we could never be a couple?”

Jemma swallowed. The tone of his voice was the calm before the storm one he used when he was ramping up for a fight. It was usually a warning sign for her to back off and wait until he had a cooler head.

“I thought we could go through a series of activities generally expected to elicit attraction, and then monitor our responses. And when no attraction is detected—”

Fitz leapt up, startling her. He started pacing the room. “This is ludicrous, Jemma.” He rarely called her Jemma—another warning sign. Perhaps she should table the discussion for now. Let him cool off. But something in her just wouldn’t allow it—she wanted this too badly.

“We’re getting off-topic. We need to understand the woman’s powers. If we can prove that what she’s saying is nonsense—”

“I’m not an experiment, Jemma.” Fitz no longer sounded angry. He sounded hurt.

“Of course you aren’t.” She jumped up and went to him, tried to place a hand on his chest. He stepped away from her. He looked into her eyes, and she saw pain in them.

“I’m done with this conversation,” he said. He walked past her toward the door.

“Wait,” she said. “Kissing.”

“What?” he stopped and turned to face her.

“Kissing,” she said. “And no electrodes.” He blinked a couple times, like he couldn’t see her clearly. “We could have dinner and pretend it’s a date and maybe kiss and see what it feels like.”

“You want to do that? Why?’

“For science,” she said. Hadn’t she already made that clear?

Fitz rubbed his face with his hand. “No equipment to test our attraction? All we have to do is say how we feel?”

“Yes.”

“And I can finally get some bloody dinner?”

“Yes.” He was hungry; that could account for a lot of the moodiness. First rule of having a Fitz—never forget to feed him.

He sighed and waved his hand toward the door. “Well then what are we waiting for? Let’s date away.”

Simmons was relieved that he had at least tentatively agreed to the plan, but she felt disappointed. This wasn’t the way a date was supposed to start.

“But you have to ask me,” she said.

“Ask you what?”

“Ask me on a date. For it to be a date. You have to ask me.”

“That seems a bit sexist, Jemma. And didn’t you already ask me, by proposing this experiment in the first place?”

Jemma huffed. Dating Fitz would apparently be just as frustrating as anything else she did with him.

“I don’t want to go on a date with you if you’re in this mood,” she said. She wasn’t sure why she was so annoyed, but she was. Very very annoyed. Couldn’t he at least try for romance, was that too much to ask?

“This whole thing was your idea,” he said. “I just want to eat dinner.”

“You can eat it on your own then.”

“Fine,” he said.

“Fine,” she said. She sat down on her bed and crossed her arms. She had no idea what was happening.

She expected Fitz to storm out, but he stood in the same spot by the door, watching her. After a few moments he came over and sat across from her on Skye’s bed again. “If I ask you on a date, can we go get dinner?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said. She refused to look at him. She wasn’t sure why, but she was hurt by his refusal to take this seriously. A date with her was a privilege. “But you have to ask me properly.”

Fitz rolled his eyes, but then he surprised her by dropping to one knee. He took her hand in his and looked up into her face. “Jemma Simmons—”

“Doctor,” she said.

The corner of Fitz’s mouth quirked up. “Dr. Jemma Simmons.” He paused with his eyebrows raised and she nodded. Acceptable.

“Will you go on a date with me?” He smiled. “I hear the diner has banana cream pie.” She wrinkled her nose—that was his favorite, not hers—and he said, “and peach cobbler.” Better. She smiled back at him.

“Yes, that sounds acceptable.”

He let go of her hand and stood. “Acceptable?”

“It sounds nice. I’d like that.”

He stared at her for a moment, his expression unreadable. Then he took her hand again and helped her off the bed (he made eye contact with her just before he did so, as though checking that it was ok, and she felt a swoop in her stomach). He started to pull his hand away, but she gripped it tighter.

“That seems like a date thing, holding hands.”

They both stared at their joined hands. “How are we going to assess the results of this experiment again?” he asked.

“Qualitative data. List of questions.”

“No lie-detector involved?” He said it like he was making a joke, but he didn’t smile.

“Of course not,” she said. Did he not trust her to be honest?

“Well then,” said Fitz. He tugged her hand to get her moving. “Let’s get this over with.”

She pulled back and glared at him.

“Which is obviously a joke. What I meant to say was ‘let’s have the best date ever.’”

Jemma rolled her eyes, but she didn’t let go of her grip on Fitz’s hand. She was flooded with a mix of emotions, all of which would take time to untangle later. This experiment was already proving fascinating.

xxx

At the diner Fitz allowed her to pick out their table, and she chose a booth.

“I’d pull out your chair for you,” he said, gesturing to her side of the booth, “but I think it’s bolted down.”

“Ha ha,” Jemma said. He seemed to be treating the date as one big joke, but even a joking romantic Fitz was quite sweet. He had held the door open for her when they had arrived and then had quickly reclaimed her hand for their short walk to the booth. She hadn’t been on a date in so long; she forgot what it felt like to have someone try to make her feel special. It was a wonderful feeling. She’d have to find a way to go on a proper date soon.

Fitz was absorbed by the menu for several minutes (“breakfast all day, can you imagine?”), and she had the opportunity to observe him. His stubble was coming in this late in the day—he needed a shave. His tie was loose, and his top shirt button was undone. He looked a little scruffy but just as handsome as ever. She wondered what they looked like to the other patrons—a young couple having dinner, perhaps. The idea thrilled her. What a pleasant experiment this was turning out to be.

“Pancakes.” Fitz had finished his lengthy diatribe about the diner’s 16-page menu and was looking at her. “Are you staring at me?”

“No,” she said, though she could feel herself blushing. She looked down at her own menu. “I like pancakes.”

Fitz was staring at her now, a devious smile on his face. “We could order a milkshake and two straws,” he said.

Jemma huffed and crossed her arms. “Why won’t you take this seriously?”

“Why would I?” he asked. “You want to prove a date between us would be terrible by trying to have a good one?”

“No, I’m—” Jemma threw up her hands, why did he have to always be so bloody smart? She’d never met a man who was more of a challenge. “I’m not trying to prove a date between us would be terrible. I’m just trying to prove we’re better off as friends.”

Fitz leaned toward her over the table, all trace of humor gone from his face. “We don’t need an experiment to tell us that. The fact that you don’t want to date me is all the proof we need that we’re not going to date, Jemma.”

“Hang on,” she said. “I didn’t say that. Stop putting words in my mouth. I didn’t say I don’t want to date you.”

“You said you wanted to ‘demonstrate that there’s no way we could ever be a couple.’ Those are your words.” He used an irritating falsetto voice to imitate her.

Jemma opened her mouth to speak but he cut her off. “Wait, are you saying you _do_ want to date me?”

She froze. He had caught her. She couldn’t admit to wanting to date Fitz—he was her best friend for goodness sake. But if she said no then he would be right and that might mean they shouldn’t even do the experiment. Which was a horrible prospect.

“I don’t know how to answer that,” she said.

He hadn’t taken his eyes off her. “Why don’t you just tell the truth?”

She couldn’t. She wasn’t certain she knew the truth.

She was saved from responding by the server, who arrived to take their orders. The young woman was short and plump and kind, and she was quite indulgent with Fitz’s many questions about pancake toppings. Too indulgent, Jemma thought. Couldn’t she see that they were on a date? Even if it wasn’t a real date, Jemma was owed something here.

Then it occurred to her that they had sat like this, had meals together like this, countless times in the years they had known one another. And perhaps they had always looked like a couple to the people around them. Or perhaps they never had. What made this time different from all the other meals they had shared?

She reached across the table and grabbed Fitz’s hand. He paused in the middle of a sentence about syrup and stared at her. “I’ll have whatever you have,” she said.

“Without the bananas?” he said.

“Yes, without the bananas,” she said quickly. She should have paid more attention to what he was ordering. She hated bananas.

He didn’t pull his hand away, at least. After the server left he asked, “What are you doing, Jemma?”

“I don’t know if I want to date you, that’s the truth,” she said. “But that’s what a first date is—an experiment. To discover if you want to date someone.”

“Ok,” he said, looking at her hand on his. “And you’re saying you want to see if we could date? That you’re open to whatever this experiment tells us?”

“I’m saying that yes, I’d like to know if we could date.” Fitz still looked skeptical. What did a woman have to do to date this man? Did she have to jump across this table and kiss him? She could, you know. That wasn’t the worst idea.

And then a horrible thought occurred to Jemma, one that she hadn’t entertained before, because it seemed too ridiculous. She _was_ a nubile young prodigy, after all.

“Do you not want to date me?” she asked. 

“Huh?” he said. He had taken the fingers of the hand she had offered him and was starting to touch them with his thumb, one by one. Now he stopped and looked up at her like an antelope in headlights. “No, that’s not it.”

“I thought you were hesitating because you weren’t sure how I felt, but is it because of how you feel?”

“No,” he said. “I mean, yes, yes it is because of how I feel, but no it’s not because I don’t want to date you. It’s because I can’t believe you want to date me.”

She pulled her hand back. Her forehead crinkled with confusion. “I just told you I did.”

Fitz’s breath caught in his throat, and Jemma realized her mistake. “For one date. To see if I want to date more.” She sighed. “This is exhausting.”

Fitz nodded. “Yeah,” he said. He thought hard for a few moments, and then he took a deep breath as though to steel himself. “Jemma?” he asked.

“Yes, Fitz?”

He stood up and walked over to sit beside her. He took her hand again in his and looked into her eyes. “Can we both agree that this is confusing as hell?”

She laughed. She wasn’t sure what she had expected him to say, but it hadn’t been that. “Yes,” she said.

“And can we agree that we’ve both been conflicted and a little… _intrigued_ by what the sorceress has been saying?”

She hesitated. “Yes.”

“And can we also agree that we are both willing to try a date—a proper date?”

“Yes,” she said. Her reply was almost a whisper, but he was so close that she knew he could hear her.

“It’s settled then.” He faced forward and looked around the room as though searching for answers. “We’re on a date.”

“A proper one,” she said.

They sat in silence for several moments, side by side and holding hands.

“Any idea what we do now?” Fitz asked.

“Nope,” she said. “Not a clue.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know why pancakes are a recurring theme in many of my FitzSimmons fics. It wasn't intentional. I'm leaning into it at this point.


	3. Chapter 3

The next few minutes were awkward. Jemma was starting to wonder if dating Fitz was all some terrible mistake (despite her original intentions, the idea of the date being a failure was sounding less and less appealing to her), when the server brought their food. Piles of pancakes. She heard Fitz’s stomach rumble, as if on command. At least the meal gave them something to do besides sit in bewildered silence.

The pancakes were warm and comforting. Fitz made an “mmmm” sound around a mouth full of pancake, and Jemma laughed. They got to eat so few good meals these days, living on a plane. Moments of quiet were a rarity too. She nudged Fitz with her elbow.

“This is nice,” she said.

He looked at her and grinned, his mouth clearly too full to speak.

“Just having time alone is nice,” she said. She leaned into his side a little, and he let her.

They were just scraping the last drops of syrup off their plates, when their phones began to flash red at the edge of the table. Jemma pulled an earpiece from her pocket and twisted it into her ear.

“Fitz and Simmons here,” she said.

“Good,” said Coulson’s voice. “Get to the motel. Garrett’s here for extract.”

“On our way,” she said. She took the earpiece out and looked at Fitz. “Back to work then,” she said.

He smiled at her, a little drop of syrup at the edge of his mouth. She reached up with her napkin and wiped it away, which he seemed to find amusing. She was grinning like an idiot too. What the hell was happening here?

Fitz was the first to break their staring contest. He stood up and offered her his hand. “To be continued?” he said. She had been feeling slightly disappointed—just when he’d agreed to the experiment it ended—but his words infused her with an almost irrational feeling of happiness. Yes, they could continue this date. Whatever the hell that meant. What even was a date? They’d had dinner; should they go see a movie next? Canoodle by a fire somewhere? Jemma had to stop herself from laughing aloud. Canoodling with Fitz—what was her mind doing to her? She had to believe it was the pancakes that were making her feel so giddy, not Fitz’s hand in hers. Too much sugar. She really should have ordered something more sensible.

They paid for their meal and meandered toward the motel. It was maybe the slowest they had ever done anything together, this walk to the extraction. Everything about their relationship was fast and furious—thoughts and ideas and words spilling out of them whenever their minds met. She had never encountered someone who excited her like Fitz. And here they were, taking slow steps and not speaking. They were no longer holding hands; she suspected that part of the date was over. They were coming back into the real world now. But if they just lingered out here long enough, it wasn’t over yet—

“Guys.” Skye was calling out to them from the motel pool, waving her arm. The rest of the team stood in a loose circle near her, with the addition of Agent Triplett and John Garrett.

“We’re here to rescue you,” said Trip, smiling his brilliant smile.

Jemma tried to smile back. “Great,” she said. Just what she’d wanted.

Coulson and Garrett debriefed about the attacks, and the group had a brainstorming session about who might be behind them (see: the Clairvoyant). After making plans for the next day, they decided the agents should spend the night at the motel. It was getting late and most of them hadn’t slept in a bed that wasn’t on a plane in weeks. (Also the old woman had had some sort of panic attack when she had encountered Garrett, and Skye had had to escort her to her room to calm her down. They weren’t eager to move her.)

Jemma felt exhausted and went straight to bed. Skye stayed up talking to Trip out by the pool, and she heard their laughter as she drifted off to sleep. She thought about texting Fitz, to thank him for a wonderful dinner, but she didn’t know if that was appropriate. She hadn’t been on a first date in so long. What was the protocol for experimental first dates with your best friend/slash work partner that you didn’t get to finish and weren’t sure you wanted to go on but now were excited to continue? She would ask Skye in the morning.

Waking the next morning, she was chipper. Giddy, even. She thought about seeing Fitz, and maybe sneaking off to finish their date. Or whatever the experiment called for next. The morning seemed so bright and full of possibility.

Her eagerness to see Fitz was cut short, though, by the discovery that the old woman was missing.

“But we were the only ones who knew what room she was in. And I was the only one with the key,” said Skye, holding up a key card and looking around the woman’s empty room. Jemma understood why she was so concerned. The woman was creepy at best, but Jemma wasn’t the only one on the team who had developed a soft spot for her.

“We’ll put out an alert,” said Coulson. “She’s in danger—”

At that moment Fitz walked up to them, the old woman on his arm. “Guess who I found enjoying the continental breakfast?” he asked.

The woman patted her stomach. “A bit peckish,” she said.

“We were worried about you, mam,” said Coulson. “You shouldn’t go wondering off.”

The woman walked up to him and patted his cheek. “You know you die more than anybody I’ve ever met,” she said, a pleasant smile on her face.

“Good to know,” said Coulson. “Now let’s get the hell out of here.”

Coulson’s team was determined to get back to their plane. They didn’t want it to fall into enemy hands, plus the old woman wouldn’t travel with Garrett (he had joked that he had a sedative he could give her, but Coulson hadn’t laughed). The only option was to go back and fix the plane with the new parts Trip had brought, while Garrett gave them cover in his plane. Trip was handy with engines, so Jemma suggested he help Fitz with the repairs. Fitz didn’t seem to like this idea (why on Earth did he have a problem with Trip—the man was a sweetheart), but they made it work.

Within a couple hours of arriving back at the Bus, the team was able to get it in the air. They were en route to the Retreat, where Coulson said the old woman would be safe. Ward joined Garrett on his plane to escort the Bus; Jemma suspected neither of them wanted to be around the old woman.

Trip was flying with the team, and Jemma showed him some of the projects that she and Fitz had been perfecting in the lab. She was just telling him about how Fitz had helped her create an antiserum for the Chitauri virus, when Fitz and the old woman appeared in the doorway.

“Fitz,” said Trip. “I hear you’re quite the hero.”

Fitz shrugged, but he seemed stiff, the way he always did with Trip. “Really?” He looked from Jemma to Trip. “To which of my many heroic endeavors are you referring?”

“There are so many to choose from,” said Jemma, smiling fondly at him. Fitz blushed and looked confused, like he wasn’t sure she was being serious. They stared at one another.

Trip cleared his throat. “I think I’m going to head out and find some grub.” He offered his arm to the old woman, who took it.

“Giiirrrl,” she said.

Trip laughed. “Don’t be stealing my catchphrase.”

Fitz walked over to Jemma and leaned on the table beside her as the others left. “Showing him our lab?”

“He’s got quite a scientific mind, for a specialist.”

Fitz picked up a prototype Night-Night gun and pretended to fire it at the wall. “OK.”

Jemma tugged his shirtsleeve. “I was thinking,” she said. “Maybe we can continue our experiment this morning.”

“What experiment?” asked Fitz. He was still fiddling with the pistol, but then he looked up at Jemma and caught the excited look in her eye. “Oh. That experiment.”

Jemma smiled. “We could pick up where we left off.”

“We’re in the lab and on a mission,” he said. “You want to turn this into a date?”

“No, of course not.” Silly Fitz. Always one step ahead of everyone else but one step behind her. Just the way she liked it. “We need to progress to the next phase. Kissing.”

Fitz dropped the Night-Night gun on the table and the crash reverberated around the room. His mouth had fallen open, and he wasn’t closing it.

“We’ve done the date, we’ve held hands, and now we need to get the heart of the experiment. Physical attraction.”

She had discussed it with Skye this morning before they had departed. Skye was adamant that no date, however wonderful, could make up for a bad kiss.

“Of course you had a good time with him, you always have a good time with him. The real test is making out. And you should have done that with Fitz like, years ago.”

Jemma had started to explain that comments like these only increased the terror she was feeling about this kiss, but Skye cut her off. “If the kissing is good, then you can take it from there. But if the kissing is bad.” She shrugged. “Then you’ll know your answer.”

Jemma had a moment of panic—she didn’t know which of those results would be more disconcerting—but Skye had winked at her and said, “But it won’t be bad. Trust me.”

Jemma had decided to trust Skye. Not about the outcome of the kiss (how could she possibly know more about her and Fitz than they did?), but about the need to just go ahead and get it over with. Jemma would be lying if she said she had never thought about kissing Fitz. She had thought about it a lot when they had first met—when she had first seen his pale skin and bright eyes. She had put those thoughts away for the betterment of their working partnership and eventual friendship, but honestly, she was only human. And Fitz was handsome, empirically so.

In this moment in the lab, his handsome face was lit up with fear, like she had just suggested he jump out of the plane without a parachute. “You want to what?”

“Kiss.”

“Here? Now?”

She looked around them. “We’re alone. And the lab setting helps convey the sense that it’s an experiment—that we’re doing it for science.” She gave him a shy smile. “Plus, I’ve already cut the video feeds.”

Fitz glanced up at the nearest camera and then back at her. “You what?”

It was actually Skye who had cut the camera feeds, but she didn’t think Fitz should know just yet about their friend’s involvement. He already looked skittish enough.

“So,” she said, stepping closer to him, “what do you think?”

Fitz backed away from her a couple steps. “Are you mental, Jemma?”

“No.” She rolled her eyes. “We’re conducting an experiment, Fitz. And we need to assess physical attraction—"

“Will you stop,” he waved his hand in the air in the universal gesture for no more. “Stop saying that. We’re in the lab, for goodness sake.”

“Which is where we conduct our experiments—”

“Oh for crying out loud,” said Fitz. “Us snogging in the lab is not an experiment, Jemma. It’s just us snogging in the lab.”

She had been coming closer and closer to him and had backed him up against a table, but now she stopped. “And is that a bad thing?” she asked.

Fitz swallowed, and she was close enough to watch his Adam’s apple move. He glanced down at her lips. “I don’t know,” he said.

“Which is the question we are trying to answer. Is us kissing bad or is it good?”

“I think you might be insane,” he said.

“That’s not what we are testing at the moment,” she said. And she leaned forward and planted her lips against his.

Fitz’s mouth went rigid as soon as she touched him, and she thought he was going to break away from her. But then he relaxed and closed his eyes. She grabbed the front of his shirt, pulling him closer. The kiss was close-mouthed and soft. She pulled away and watched him blink a couple of times.

She took a deep breath and tried to speak. “Well—” She was cut off by Fitz’s mouth against hers.

He cupped the back of her head with his hand and kissed her again. This kiss was more heated. Their lips were moving in tandem with a rhythm that she knew well. The fiery passion they ignited in one another’s minds, though now it was being expressed by their bodies. He was infusing the kiss with something that made her heart race. Hunger.

“Hey, you,” said a woman’s voice behind them, and Fitz and Simmons broke apart, gasping.

The old woman stood in the doorway, a grin on her face. Trip was standing beside her, his mouth open in shock.

“Uhhh. We just came to tell you we’ll be landing soon,” he said. “Sorry to interrupt.”

The old woman turned to him and patted his shoulder. “Maybe some things are inevitable,” she said.

He put his arm around her and led her away, his face still betraying his surprise.

“Oops,” said Jemma. She turned to look at Fitz, who looked about as shocked as Trip. “Maybe trying this in the lab wasn’t our best idea.”

He didn’t look at her but stared at his hands, which seemed to be shaking slightly. “I should go check with May about the landing gear,” he said. “Make sure everything’s working properly.”

“Yes, of course—” she said, but he was already out the door before she could finish. She plopped down on her lab chair and stared at the wall. She was going to need a minute to recover after…whatever the hell had just happened to her entire world. That kiss was…she did not have the proper vocabulary to describe it. She was just going to keep staring at this wall until she could catch her breath.

xxx

The landing was smooth, and there was no evidence they had been followed to the Retreat. Still, Coulson was concerned.

“Something doesn’t feel right,” he said. “Why would they give up?”

May was preparing their SUV for transport to the Retreat, which was hidden in a hillside a few miles away. “Maybe they realized they couldn’t win.”

“Or maybe they already got what they wanted,” said Coulson, staring at the old woman.

She was standing between Skye and Fitz, and she tried to back behind them when Ward and Garrett walked up onto the ramp. “Whatever that is, it’s not love,” she said.

“New orders, Phil,” said Garrett. “I’m to take the woman to the Retreat while you head back to HQ to get your plane checked out.”

“Who’s orders?” asked Coulson.

“Came from the top. Injured Bird Protocol. Fury always did have a soft spot for you.” He clapped Coulson on the shoulder.

“I’m aware of the protocol,” said Coulson. “Which is why I didn’t alert HQ we needed assistance. I only told you.”

Garrett shrugged. “Just doing my job, Phil. Hey, no one’s surprised more than me that I’m better at following the rules than you are.”

Trip trotted up to them from the front of the Bus. “Just got word, sir,” he said to Coulson.

“Garrett’s to take the woman, and we’re to head back to HQ.”

“Yep,” said Trip. He turned to Garrett. “You need me to accompany you, sir?”

“No, Trip. They may need you for repairs. I’ll keep Ward for the transport.” He looked at Coulson. “If that’s all right with you, Phil.”

Coulson hesitated, not taking his eyes off of Garrett’s grinning face, but then he nodded. “If those are our orders.”

Ward walked up the ramp and reached for the old woman. Her eyes were large, and she was trying to back away. She grabbed Skye’s arm and suddenly she screamed, “Ward is Hydra.”

The team fell silent. Even Ward looked shocked and dropped the arm that had been reaching for her.

Garrett was the first to speak. “I bet you’ll be glad to get this one off your plane. Nuttier than my great-aunt Claudine’s pecan pie.”

Ward took the old woman’s arm. “I’m not going to hurt you,” he said, but there was a steel in his voice that Jemma had never heard before.

“Stop,” said Coulson. Ward froze, still holding the struggling woman. Garrett put a hand on Coulson’s shoulder.

“Honestly, Phil, you believe this nonsense? There isn’t a Hydra anymore. We ended those squids years ago.”

The sorceress looked into Coulson’s eyes. “We’ve had a wolf in the herd the whole time,” she said.

Coulson shrugged off Garrett’s hand. “You knew if our plane went down you could get the woman,” he said.

“Now hold on just a minute,” said Garrett. “I’ve been in S.H.I.E.L.D. just as long as you have, Phil. You’re going to believe this crazy old woman over me?”

“Why do you need the woman, John?” asked Coulson. “You need a real Clairvoyant to keep up your ruse? Or because you need her silent?”

Ward was dragging the woman over to Garrett, who sighed. “I guess there’s no reasoning with you. Shame we couldn’t do this without bloodshed. I blame you for this, Phil.” He turned his head to Ward, who now stood beside him. “You know what to do, son.”

Ward pulled out his weapon with the hand not gripping the old woman. A gunshot echoed in the metal hangar, and Ward collapsed, blue veins threading across his face.

May stood on the railing above them, a Night-Night rifle in her hands. She had it aimed at Garrett. “Stop. Talking,” she said.

Garrett aimed his gun at Coulson’s head. “I can do more than ta—” he said, but he was cut off by another round from May’s gun.

“You warned him,” said Coulson.

Trip ran over to secure the two men who were now lying on the ramp, and Skye rushed to help the old woman up where she had fallen under Ward’s weight.

“What the hell is happening?” said Fitz. “You shot Ward.”

Jemma grabbed his hand. “Fitz, he wasn’t good.”

“He was working with Garrett,” said Coulson. He looked down at the fallen agents. “And Garrett’s the Clairvoyant.”

“We don’t know that,” said Fitz.

“Fitz, he as good as confessed,” said Jemma.

“Maybe Ward was just following orders and didn’t know about Garrett. He was his S.O.”

“Fitz,” said Coulson, “This is hard for all of us to accept. But I promise you, we will get to the bottom of it. If Ward wasn’t a part of this, we’ll figure it out.”

“Good,” said Fitz. “Cause the last thing I want is for things to change.”

The old woman moved away from Skye and put her hand on Fitz’s shoulder. “Fitz,” she said. “It’s too late for that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very short epilogue left.


	4. Epilogue

Jemma was leaning back on the sofa in the commons area of the Bus, Fitz’s head in her lap. Her hand was in his hair.

“It’s not fair,” he mumbled.

“What’s not fair?”

“We don’t even get a day off for our anniversary.” He sat up to see her better. “I was thinking we could do something. Something nice.”

Jemma smiled at him. She had thought she’d known everything about this man, but in the six months that they’d been dating she’d learned a lot of new things. Like that he was a romantic.

“Perhaps we can get Coulson to at least give us an evening off the Bus,” she said. “There’s a nice bed and breakfast by the Retreat.”

Trip heard her as he walked by. “Yes, please. They’ve got these little mimosas on Sundays.” He continued to the back of the plane. “Wheels down in ten.”

Fitz sat all the way up and stretched his arms. “Yay,” he said, with more than a hint of sarcasm. “Deliver the good news.”

“Fitz, you know Ward and Garrett are guilty. The investigation proved it. And revealed the rest of Hydra within S.H.I.E.L.D. We’re lucky we found out in time.”

Fitz sighed, and she rubbed circles into his back. “I know. I just, I still can’t believe it. I thought he was our friend.”

“Not everything is at it seems at first. We know that.” She gave him a soft peck on the lips.

At the Retreat, the team was taken to a room with one glass wall that looked out over a garden. The old woman sat there waiting for them, a mouse on her shoulder.

Coulson tried to explain to her that Ward and Garrett were no longer a threat, and that her help had saved a lot of lives.

“You’re a hero,” he said.

The woman patted him on the arm. “You are the symbol,” she said. “There is no S.H.I.E.L.D. without you.”

Coulson smiled at her, as though her words meant something more to him than nonsense.

The team spent the afternoon having tea with the old woman and walking with her through the garden.

“You think she’s happy here?” asked Skye.

“She seems to be,” said Jemma. “Anyway, with her abilities I don’t think it’s safe for her out in the world.”

The woman walked up to the two of them on Fitz’s arm.

“I was just telling her that I know she did the right thing. That we did the right thing. Even if the last time she saw me I was upset,” said Fitz. He left the woman and walked to Jemma’s side.

“It’s been a wild ride, these last few months,” said Skye.

“We’ve all been through a lot of changes,” Jemma said. She took Fitz’s hand. “Not all of them bad.”

The old woman smiled at them. “You’re just different now,” she said. “And there’re nothing wrong with that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, I don't own these characters or any of the lines that are quotes from the show. Thanks for reading!


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